The Belgian public prosecutor has closed a five-year investigation into allegations that Hans-Martin Tillack, an investigative reporter for the German news weekly Stern, bribed EU officials to get confidential information.

The Belgian prosecutor decided on Tuesday (6 January) that there was insufficient evidence of corruption by the journalist.

The decision to close the case was welcome by the European Federation of Journalists (EIF). Its secretary-general, Aidan White, described the investigation as a “tawdry affair” in which justice had been denied. The case, he argued, should have been open and shut within days.

As part of the investigation, the Belgian police raided Tillack’s home and office and seized documents and computer files, following up a dossier drawn up by the European Commission’s anti-fraud unit OLAF, which alleged that Tillack had paid €8,000 to a European Commission official in exchange for confidential documents.

Following a complaint by Tillack, the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg in 2007 condemned Belgium for failing to uphold Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which enshrines the right of journalists to protect their sources. The court ordered Belgium to pay Tillack costs of €40,000 and compensation of €10,000.

White said that the allegations of bribery made by the Commission were “clearly an attempt to discredit [Tillack], his character and his journalism”.

He added that the complaints were made deliberately to identify Tillack’s source inside the Commission and to intimidate the reporter and constrain his work investigating corruption and wrongdoing.

White called for the European Commission and OLAF to apologise publicly for their mistakes. He said that the EIF would be writing to the European Commission’s president, José Manuel Barroso, to ask for those who had made the complaints against the journalist to be held responsible for their actions.

Speaking at a press conference on Brussels, Tillack questioned why the Belgian police and judicial authorities had put so much time and resources into pursuing the case when the German police and prosecutor had dismissed a similar complaint within days. He said that the Commission and OLAF had argued that they had no choice but to hand over files to the relevant national prosecutor. Tillack said, though, that there had been other cases when OLAF had evidence of criminal activity but had not transferred the files to the authorities.

A spokesman for OLAF said that they had not received official confirmation of any decision by the Belgian authorities and would not be able to make any comment until they had been informed.

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Ray Finch

Typical of the heavy handed bullying and corruption of The EU.
First, unsubstantiatable charges are made against a journalist working to uncover some of the corruption inherent in the system and then a refusal to apologise and admit it was wrong.
This is why anybody who takes even a cursory glance at the EUs institution fear and despise them.

And you wonder why people are completely disinterested in Europe. The EU is not a democratic institution, can not be held to account and only creates work for itself regardless of the impact of it’s actions on the people of Europe. The original intentions (no more war, economic cooperation between EU states) seems to have been forgotten in favour of nepotism, corruption and spin.

If only Europe would become a true nation state, with proper, direct elections where people can run for office in whichever country they choose, regardless of the origin of their passport.

I’m a Dutch national living in the UK and would love to get involved in politics, but I can’t voice my opinion as it is discounted as irrelevant for the UK. I would have to go back to Holland to get involved and only because of a piece of paper stating I’m Dutch.

I don’t see the point of getting a UK passport and dismissing my roots in order to get involved. Unless politicians see the light when it comes to democracy, people will not want to get involved in Europe. It’s simple, but too much asked from our current nest feathering lot of politicians.

True, I can get involved on a local level, but what good is that when the real issues are decided nationally and in Brussels?

I think it’s time to emigrate to Australia……..

Posted on 1/8/09 | 7:24 AM CET

heljä turkka

Olaf & Belgian polices behavior resembles that of former Russian and USA.
People should be active and demand more open politics for critics and give media support to study the behavior of EU institutions.